L.M. Montgomery is a long time and all time favorite author of mine. She writes the perfect girls story with just the right mix of adventure, drama and happiness. I find her books a comfort to read and have re-read most of her works many times over the years. They are classics for a reason and that reason is they are great. These are true comfort books for me and books I enjoy re-reading again and again. ( )

I remember doing a speech when I was about eleven years old called "My Favourite Authoress" which was about L. M. Montgomery. At that point I had probably read a few of the Anne books and maybe some of the Emily books and maybe A Tangled Web because I remember it being in our bookshelf. I have since gone on to read all of L. M. Montgomery's novels and a few collections of short stories that were available but I thought that was it. I've even read Budge Wilson's prequel to Anne of Green Gables which tells what Anne experienced before she was adopted by Mathew and Marilla. I had not heard that more stories had been discovered and collected and it was pure accident that I found this book in a library book sale. Rea Wilmshurst found a cache of 300 stories at Montgomery's birthplace in PEI. She has compiled them into eight volumes of which this is one. I intend to keep my eyes open for the other seven because L. M. Montgomery's writing still captivates me.

I think my favourite from this volume is the story called "How we Went to the Wedding". It chronicles the adventures of two young women travelling 120 miles across the Saskatchewan prairie to attend a wedding. The weather, untypically, had been rainy for three weeks previously and the trail was boggy threatening to enclose their horses and buggy in gumbo. Habitations were few and far between so they camped out most evenings. Through bad weather, injured horses and broken equipment they persevered and certainly typify the type of stories included in this volume. Another great story is "The Strike at Putney" which I know has been made into a play. A group of church women are told by the church elders and minister that they cannot have a female missionary give a talk in the church because no woman should occupy the pulpit. The women decide to go on strike, no longer raising funds by holding bake sales and socials, not leading Sunday School classes, not singing in the choir, even the woman organist sat in the pews for church service. The elders and minister soon see the error of their ways and allow the missionary to speak from the pulpit. This and other stories show that, for her time, Montgomery was a women's rights advocate. Just shows I knew what I was doing when I chose her as my "favourite authoress". ( )

These stories are primarily ones that never saw the light of day after being published in magazines in Montgomery's lifetime. There's a reason for that. I love reading more my L.M. Montgomery, but these are not my favorites. Maybe because they're grouped together by theme? The stories get very repetitive. And some of the stories showed up as scenes in her books. Fans of Montgomery should read these, but don't pick this up expecting to fall in love with it. ( )

Against the Odds is a compilation of stories depicting some difficult roadblock for the character(s) in the short story. They're vaguely inspirational, but not in such a way as to be grating. These stories don't measure up to the quality level set by Montgomery's more popular works, but that didn't diminish my enjoyment of them. ( )

http://books.moonsoar.com/archives/2007/12/06/against-the-odds/ ( )